That may be the hon. Gentleman's view, but this is my hon. Friend's Adjournment Debate, and it is her privilege to determine who should contribute to it.

As my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said when the report was published, it was without doubt one of the worst reports on any police force; but before I discuss the report itself, and the action that we are taking, I must draw an important distinction between the Derbyshire constabulary and the police authority.

The members of the Derbyshire constabulary have done an excellent job in maintaining standards of service as well as they have in what can only be described as the most difficult circumstances. My right hon. Friend and I have great admiration for the way in which it has managed to maintain a high standard of professional policing while buildings deteriorate around it and the police authority imposes absurd levels of bureaucratic control on the police budget.

It is with the police authority that the responsibility lies. Under section 4 of the Police Act 1964, it is the police authority that has the duty to secure the maintenance of an adequate and efficient police force for the area", and, as the inspection report shows, it has come perilously close to failing in that duty.

My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South has already drawn the House's attention to the manifold failings of the police authority—the failure to devolve any significant financial responsibility to the chief constable; agreed expenditure having to be reapproved through a labyrinth of council committees; civilian posts left vacant, or taking six months to fill; trained police officers being taken off the streets to cover for civilian vacancies; 19 additional posts approved by the Home Secretary for 1990, but turned down by the council; maintenance budgets consistently underspent while broken windows remain unrepaired—and so on, and so on. The report is a published document, as all HMI reports now are, and the details are set out in it by the regional HMI better than I could hope to do tonight. It repays careful reading—particularly, I suggest, by the hon. Member for Derbyshire, North-East.

Let me pull out just one chastening detail. Paragraph 3.5 points out that the casualty bureau is antiquated and that the four incoming telephone lines would be inadequate to deal with the demands of a major disaster. The HMI concludes that the system would fail under any realistic pressure". The House has listened too often to statements from Ministers detailing the horrific disasters which have befallen us in recent years. None of us can say that it will not happen in my county, and we know the pressure of thousands of phone calls from anxious relatives. Therefore, I find the complacency of Derbyshire frightening and inexplicable.

What is the response of Derbyshire county council? It is to blame the Government for cuts in funding. Well, I suppose they would say that. But what puzzles me is this: if it is all the fault of the Government, as they say, why is it only Derbyshire that faces such extreme problems? The same funding principles apply across the country, but Her Majesty's inspectorate reports for other counties present a very different picture, with an effective partnership between the police authority and its police force. There is no magic that uniquely puts Derbyshire in a worse position than its neighbours. The issue is simply that Derbyshire county council, through its police authority, exercises a very different set of priorities on policing.

It is instructive to look closely at how Derbyshire adjusted its budget for 1990–91 in response to capping. The county council's total original budget was 40 per cent. above the standard spending assessment, but the original police budget of £29 million was marginally below the police SSA of £29.6 million. No cuts at all need have been made in the police budget, but the council imposed a uniform cut of 3.5 per cent.—nearly £2 million—to finance its overspending in other quarters. The council was well aware of the damage that would do to the police: last August, the chief constable, the clerk to the police authority and the county treasurer wrote jointly: The reductions for the constabulary will cut deeply into the level of service provided to the people of Derbyshire. The hon. Member for Derbyshire, North-East would no doubt complain about the effect of reduction in capital provision, but the reduction in capital provision applies to forces across the country, not just to Derbyshire. Derbyshire's protests sound a little hollow when one remembers that the authority has not seriously attempted to upgrade its police building stock for many years.

Derbyshire tells us that the inspectorate's criticism has come out of the blue and that things cannot have deteriorated so swiftly since the previous year's inspection. Indeed they did not. That is why letters to the chairman of the police committee in 1987, 1988 and 1989 drew attention to a range of serious concerns about delays in filling vacancies, the budget review process and the absence of a building programme. It is the sustained failure of the police authority to take action on these matters that has led to the present deplorable situation.

It is clear that I shall not have time to finish the remarks that I wanted to make in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South. In summary, the inspectorate is staying closely in touch with Derbyshire. A number of measures to improve efficiency have already been put in hand. The responsibility for meeting these criticisms rests firmly with the Derbyshire authorities, and my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary will be receiving reports on the matter. If the situation does not improve, he has a responsibility to make sure that in the end it does; but I hope that it will not come to that.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at seventeen minutes to One o'clock.